Honoring a Man Who Deserves It

Jocy, Mother, Papa at Miles Brown's baptism.

Last Sunday's lesson from the Joseph Smith manual was about how much he loved his own family and how we should learn from the example of Asael Smith's descendants to make our homes heavenly places. I told the brethren flat out that I'd always wanted to be more like my father. Some of them said they'd always wanted to be a little better than their fathers. I'm sorry that their experiences led them to that goal. All I know is that, for 58 years, my father has been my idea of what a man should be. I felt this way as a small child. I felt this way as I grew up. I have grown even stronger in this desire since I, myself became a father and grandfather.

Today's blog post by my daughter, Autumn Marie Mulverhill, really got to my heart. It featured photos of relatives old and new at beautiful places like upper and lower Mesa Falls. It featured photos of a son I haven't seen for years and of his wife and of their adorable baby boy. Above all, it showed my father giving his classic "treatment" to my grandson Clayton. This treatment involves enveloping a baby or small child in a big, beefy cloud of warmth and security, all the while beaming down on them a look of love and approval which I've never seen anyone beat. I've quoted Theodore Roosevelt (TR) in this blog as having said that his father was "the best man I ever knew.") I can and do unequivocally adopt that phrase as being representative of my feelings about my father.

His stories of his misadventures as a child and young man, his fights and difficulties in the navy, the amazing and sometimes likable people he has known in the navy and throughout his life, his accounts of German-speaking relatives and their hard-headed ways, and his teasing of my mother and others whom he loves with a perfect and eternal love are all elements of what makes him adorable to his family. Whether you call him "Sir," "Dad," "Daddy," "Papa," "Grand-dad," or "John," he is the most impressive person many have ever met. Years after his term as a bishop on the Ricks campus, he kept receiving calls and cards from couples and individuals who looked upon him as the angel of their youthful crossroads.

I grow frustrated sometimes with my inability to express to either of my parents my gratitude for the special things they have taught me which seem to have been left out of virtually everyone else's upbringing. Growing up in Papa's house, we heard phrases of Philipino language, and learned to scatter when he said "Ewass!" Being awakened in the morning by him was a sort of treat, because he would often imitate what the old chief had said each morning at the Great Lakes Naval Training Center: "Alright, you people! Reveille!") To grow up around him was to be constantly enthralled by the stories of memorable personalities he had known. The hugely fat fellow who, upon leaving ship, would go into the nearest tavern, set his stomach on the bar, and say "Fill 'er up!" The outrageous Vulyanov, the crude Russian with the impressive moustache, who almost got them all killed with his vile remark in Canada on the occasion of the death of George VI. Buster Madriaga, his little Mexican buddy, who unhesitatingly dropped his hat when the huge fellow from a carrier crew said, "I'll fight you at the drop of a hat." Papa's own accidental ventilation of the web of the hand of a fellow Shore Patrolman when the fellow tried to hail an ambulance with an upraised hand while my father signaled it with a shot in the air from his 1911 .45 Government Model pistol. "The old man really chewed us out for that one." No matter who the captain was, he was always "the old man."

From him I learned what a friendship based on the Spirit can be. He is grateful for the change the Gospel has brought into his life. Many times I've heard him say that he doesn't even want to think of what his life would have become without it.

I was riding with him once when we lived in Twin Falls. I think we were restocking vending machines, one of many jobs he took to make ends meet. The radio was on and tuned to KTFI, an NBC affiliate there in Twin. A story of the pope at that time (John XXIII) was on and he listened to it for a moment. Then he began to tap his finger with increasing impatience on the steering wheel. I knew that he was about to say something meaningful and important, something not to be forgotten. What he finally said as he pointed to the car's radio, was "I have more priesthood in my little finger than that guy has in his whole body!" Now, he wasn't bragging. Not a bit. He was testifying! He wanted me, the only kid in the car, to know what the Holy Ghost had testified to him. And I've never forgotten it. I know by the power of the same spirit Personage that his statement was true. I could want nothing more than to be as good a man as my father.

John Albert Haeberle, 2005

Babies are always comfortable with him.

Joseph with his grandparents just before his mission.

Canoeing with Papa.

Himself.

Granddaddy checks Eliza's fingers for the correct number.

Direct offspring (except John.)

Dallin's turn with Great Grand-daddy.

Reading the 80th birthday card from the gang.

A private moment after Jennifer presents the grandchildren's quilt to my father.

Andrew takes his turn at his Great-grandfather's 80th birthday observance.

Eliza poses with my father at his 80th birthday celebration.

Mathew gets squeezed properly at his Great-Grandfather's 80th birthday celebration.